FIANA Fáil councillor Kieran O’Hanlon highlighted incidents of “petty criminal activity” by youths on scrambler bikes in Rhebogue and urged Gardaí to keep on top of this issue.
Speaking at a meeting of the Joint Policing Sub-Committee of the Metropolitan District, Cllr O’Hanlon praised Gardaí for seizing a large number scramblers in recent months but called for them to “keep their foot on it” as new legislation is passed into law.
“There was one lady who had four guys come down on scramblers and wrecked her front lawn. Now the lady is going to have to put a wall up. But because she reported the incident to the Gardaí, these guys came back deliberately to intimidate her and done her windows,” the City North representative told the meeting.
“When I knocked on doors last summer in Garryowen, nearly every house had complaints about scramblers but I am not getting these complaints nowadays, so hopefully that issue is partially resolved.”
Superintendent Andrew Lacey, of Henry Street Garda Station, said the issue raised in Rhebogue correlated with incidents reported in Irish Estates and Shannon Banks in recent weeks.
“We have done a couple of operations at weekends. Thankfully the last couple of weekends we haven’t seen it, but there was a spike in scrambler presence and a few incidents on one particular night where there was a lot of complaints and issues,” Superintendent Lacey explained.
The superintendent said that Gardaí are “massively committed to staying on top” of the issue, and that “a lot of work went into the initial operation and, from a national perspective, we lead the way on that and we are not going to sit back now to let it creep back in”.
Fine Gael councillor Sarah Kiely said that local residents are claiming those involved in anti-social behaviour are underage and so do not report issues as they believe nothing can be done.
“When I try to encourage them to contact the Gardaí, the answer we usually get is ‘what’s the point? They are underage’,” Cllr Kiely said.
“I think we need to send a really strong message to the general public that, unless they ring the Gardaí, there’s very little that we can actually do.”
Responding to the councillor’s point, Superintendent Paul Reidy, of Roxboro Garda Station, stressed the importance of reporting underage offences.
“We would greatly encourage every person who has an issue or a complaint to make, regardless of the age of a suspect concerned, to report it. Without us becoming aware of it, we can’t do anything about it,” he insisted.
